BlogWorld Marks Its New York Debut With Dynamic Panels and Heavyweight Keynote Speakers

NEW YORK, May 20, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Rick Calvert, Co-founder and CEO of BlogWorld, today announced the panels and keynote speakers who will cap off each day of BlogWorld & New Media Expo New York - the world's largest and most comprehensive blogging, new media and social media conference - taking place at the Jacob Javits Convention Center May 24-26.

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"We chose to bring BlogWorld to New York City because it is 'The Media Capital of the World,'" says Calvert. "We set out to create the greatest BlogWorld experience possible for our attendees and our keynote speakers are no exception. They are the best in the business and we are thrilled to bring such a high caliber group together under one roof."

Keynote speakers and panelists include:

Tuesday, May 24 at 5:00 P.M. (Opening Night Keynote)

Social Media Game Changers. Gary Vaynerchuk, Jeffrey Hayzlett and H.P. Mallory navigate the role of social media as a critical driver in business beyond marketing and PR, and how it is radically changing the face of entire industries. They will explore the changing rules for sales, customer service, product development, and what both new and old media companies need to know to compete and survive in this brave new world of 24/7 media.

• Gary Vaynerchuk, New York Times best-selling author of The Thank You Economy, is a wine enthusiast that transformed his family's wine store into a large-scale web retailer through his early adoption of social media. He is considered the first wine guru of the Internet and sells $60 million worth of wine per year.  With his unconventional commentary, Gary has attracted a cult-like following of more than 80,000 viewers ("Vayniacs") a day through his video blog, Wine Library TV.
• Jeffrey Hayzlett is widely recognized as one of the most influential marketers of our time, and previously led the turnaround of Kodak as its Chief Marketing Officer.  A business change agent, sometime cowboy and best-selling author of The Mirror Test: Is Your Business Really Breathing, he has been hailed a "Celebrity CMO" by Forbes Magazine and admired by thought leaders and business moguls such as Donald Trump.
• H.P. Mallory is the best-selling indie author of paranormal romance and urban fantasy novels including Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble, the Jolie Wilkins series, and the Dulcie O'Neil series.  She made her name through self-publishing E-books after being turned down by all of the major publishing houses.  She is now signed with Random House (Bantam books) to publish the next three books in the Jolie Wilkins series.

Wednesday, May 25, 5:00 P.M.  (Day 2 Keynote)

Mega LBS or Mega BS: 3 Mega Brands Talk Check-ins, Loyalty, Discovery and Deals. Mike Schneider and Aaron Strout lead this discussion with representatives from three of the world's top 25 brands:  PepsiCo, Disney and American Express.  In this new era of data-driven personal marketing, some are calling knowing a person's exact location - and providing them content at the exact time they need it - the holy grail of marketing, or at least a piece of the grail.  With location-based marketing all the rage, panelists examine what knowing a person's location means to key activity streams and how to make the most of these opportunities.    

• Mike Schneider is Senior Vice President, Director Digital Incubator at Allen & Gerritsen, ranked by Advertising Age as one of the Top 50 Independent advertising agencies in the US.  He is co-author of Location-based Marketing for Dummies and recognized in 2010 as a Boston Business Journal 40 Under 40.  He hosts the web show, Tech Interruption.
• Aaron Strout, Social Media Group Director at WCG, is a leading mobile and location-based marketing expert who co-authored the book, Location-based Marketing for Dummies.  He is a founding member and former president of (BIMA), a member and former board member of the Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange (MITX) and sits on the advisory board of the prestigious Social Media Club.  He is syndicated on socialmediainformer.com.
• Josh Karpf is Senior Manager of Digital Media Communications for PepsiCo, the $60 billion food and beverage company known for iconic brands Quaker, Gatorade, Frito-Lay and Pepsi Cola.
• Tom Aronson is Director of Digital Marketing for Walt Disney Parks & Resorts.  Prior to Disney, he was Digital Marketing Manager at 20th Century Fox, and a Senior Account Executive at Grey Worldwide Account Executive at TBWA/Chiat/Day Advertising.
• David Wolf is Vice President of Global Marketing Capabilities at American Express, leads the business and technology strategies behind American Express' digital partnerships. His team develops the global capabilities that powered the recent cutting-edge marketing partnerships with Foursquare and LevelUp delivering first-ever experiences and value for merchants and consumers.

Thursday, May 26 at 5:00 P.M. (Closing Night Keynote)

NEW MEDIA LIVE! Talk Show. BlogWorld concludes with a tradition and fan favorite, in the format of a late-night talk show, featuring Chris Brogan, Chris Pirillo, Shauna Glenn and Andrew Breitbart and produced by Jonathan Weirich. Their takes on the trends and state of the industry are sure to be irreverent, humorous, off-beat, entertaining, insightful and edgy.

• Chris Brogan is president of Human Business Works and co-founder of the PodCamp new media conference series. He is co-author of the New York Times bestselling book Trust Agents, a featured columnist at Entrepreneur Magazine, and an Entrepreneur in Residence at CrossTech Ventures. His blog, chrisbrogan.com, is in the Top 5 of the Advertising Age Power150.
• Chris Pirillo is the author of several books, including Poor Richard's E-mail Publishing, Online!; and founder of Lockergnome, a network of blogs, web forums, mailing lists and online communities. He hosted the TechTV television program Call for Help, as well as the first annual Call-for-Help-a-Thon, and numerous videos on internet sites including CNN, YouTube, ustream.tv.  He formerly was a columnist for CPU Magazine.
• Andrew Breitbart runs his own news aggregation site, Breitbart.com, and five other websites including Breitbart.tv, Big Hollywood, Big Government, Big Journalism, and Big Peace.  He is author of the New York Times best-selling book, Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World.  He writes for the Washington Times and is a frequent talk show guest commentator.  He also helped launch The Huffington Post.
• Shauna Glenn is the author of two fiction novels, Heaping Spoonful and Relative Insanity, and the wildly popular humor website Is It 5 O'clock Yet? She also writes a monthly column called Parental Guidance Suggested in Fort Worth Texas magazine. A self-proclaimed forty something year old woman trapped in a 12 year old boy, mother of four, wine drinker, part-time knife juggler, alphabet belcher and winner of nothing except a Cabbage Patch doll when she was twelve!
• Jonathan Weirich, producer of New Media Live!, is an actor, filmmaker and a veteran of both the New York City Off-Broadway theater scene and independent film circuit. He gained hands-on knowledge of production from the grass roots level and most recently completed a stint at My Damn Channel. His websites are JonathanWeirich.com and JakeLegFilms.com.

The public can still purchase passes to BlogWorld & New Media Expo, which is co-located with Book Expo America (BEA), a leading publishing industry tradeshow.  BlogWorld conference pass holders will be allowed entrance to both conferences. Conference session descriptions, exhibitor list and registration details are available at www.blogworldexpo.com. An online interactive conference schedule, powered by Sched.org is available at http://blogworld-nyc2011.sched.org.

BlogWorld & New Media Expo 2011 in New York is sponsored by premium brands such as: Ford Motor Company, Century 21 Real Estate, WordPress.com, Network Solutions, Mashable, Posterous, Vanilla Forums, Groupon, Paper.li and more. The keynote presentations will be streamed live courtesy of Stickam, the official Streaming Sponsor of BlogWorld NY. Featured speaker interviews and news reports from the Expo will be presented by TechZulu.

ABOUT BLOGWORLD & NEW MEDIA EXPO

BlogWorld & New Media Expo is the first and only industry-wide tradeshow, conference and media event dedicated to promoting the dynamic industry of new media. Thousands of attendees learn about Content Creation, Distribution, Monetization and Social Media Marketing strategies, including step-by-step techniques and bleeding-edge tools from the most successful and influential Bloggers, Podcasters, Vloggers, Web TV & Radio Broadcasters, Social Influencers, New Media Pros and Online Journalists.

For upcoming event info and announcements, subscribe to e-news at www.blogworldexpo.com and get the latest new media industry news at www.blogworld.com.

Media Contact:
Katherine Randall
[email protected]
858-366-2962

SOURCE BlogWorld & New Media Expo